Wabmester: Weaving In and Out of Workforce

[BigMoneyJim]

This is in response to a Wabmester post on another forum. Since my question is about that 4-letter word "w*rk" I thought I'd move it here.

I didn't realize that weaving in and out of the workforce was even on somebody's radar. Do a lot of people do this? I know I did.

I could never stand to be in one job for more than a few years, and I never got over losing summer vacations after graduating. So, after a few years working somewhere, I'd quit my job, take a summer vacation, and then either start a business, go back to school for another degree, or find another job.

I'm pretty sure I'm done weaving now, but you never know....

When returning to work after a period of time off, did you find it difficult to get a job again? Last time I took a few months off I had a really hard time finding a job, and I figured it was at least partly due to the time off work. Then again I was looking for tech work in fall 2000, so the market was bad.

Most of my experience is with one company and I never got good at interviewing and getting a job with a new company.

If I were good at it and employers didn't mind my time off work I would probably do as Wabmester did. I also never got over the loss of summer vacation, and I get really tired of a job after 3 - 5 years.

[bow-tie]

BMJ, *I can very much relate with your concerns. *I find myself asking "is this it" with my job(s) after a few years. *It's something I have to work on, but it's difficult.

I also miss my long breaks (summer vaca) and don't have the gumption to take an sabbatical w/o great concern about where my next bout of employement will come from. *Probably because I am afraid of landing in a position of equal or less value of where I came from. *

And the thought of jeopardizing my FIRE goal really weighs on my decision...

[wabmester]

When returning to work after a period of time off, did you find it difficult to get a job again?

I never had any trouble. In fact, I usually had multiple offers (and my only mistake was occasionally chosing the wrong offer, like blowing off MSFT in 1987 and AOL in 1996).

But I had at least three things going for me:

1) The job market for software weenies was very strong whenever I did this (1981, 1985, 1987, 1996, 1999, and finally in 2002 (a good time to exit, I think)).

2) I was pretty self-confident, and sometimes I think that's more important in landing a job than smarts, experience, etc.

3) I started a couple of companies, which gave me valuable experience, made my resume look pretty good, and perhaps most importantly, it meant that my resume never had any gaps since I always kept a company "alive" even if I wasn't very actively participating. Great for tax breaks too

And I never cared if I had a job or not, assuming
I would make it work no matter what happened.

John Galt